40,000 more UP government housing units in offing

Proposed to be constructed under the state government's flagship Samajwadi Awas Yojana, the housing units will not only be constructed by various development authorities and the UPHDB but also by private developersPankaj Shah | TNN | October 21, 2015, 12:00 IST

LUCKNOW: The UP Housing and Development Board (UPHDB) and various other development authorities may be sitting over residential and commercial properties worth over Rs 7,000 crore, but that has not deterred the Akhilesh Yadav government from coming up with 40,000 more housing units across the state.

Proposed to be constructed under the state government's flagship Samajwadi Awas Yojana, the housing units will not only be constructed by various development authorities and the UPHDB but also by private developers.

The housing department has already given its nod to the construction of 10,500 housing units by the UPHDB, 5,000 by the Kanpur Development Authority (KDA), 2,000 by the Ghaziabad Development Authority (GDA) and 1,000 by the Lucknow Development Authority (LDA). Besides, the department has shown the green flag to detail project report (DPRs) of two private builders for the construction of 1,700 and 1,400 housing units in Ghaziabad and Moradabad, respectively.

The department is also in the final stages of clearing the DPRs of 11 builders who have together shown interest in the construction of over 23,000 housing units. Of these, four builders are keen on coming up with housing units in DPRs , Ghaziabad three in Hapur and one each in Meerut, Mathura, Agra and Barabanki.

Sources said the proposals involve change of land use which is to be done by the respective development authorities in the state. "The proposals are being studied by the development authorities," said a senior official in the department.

Principal secretary, housing, Sadakant confirmed that construction was expected to take off by the new year. "The scheme has been conceptualised considering the demand for affordable houses," he said. The affordability of the housing units, he said, will be a result of sops offered by the state government in the form of development and land use conversion charge waiver. The cost of the units will range from Rs 2,500 per sq ft to Rs 3,300 per sq ft.

The scheme is also perceived as a government attempt to arrest the proliferating growth of unauthorized colonies in the suburbs of big towns like Ghaziabad, Noida and Lucknow over the past few years.

According to the draft plan of the scheme, private builders will choose land, ostensibly agricultural, on their own, much like private colonies that have come up on agricultural land in brazen violation of city master plans.

While the unauthorized colonies have been getting their layout map sanctioned illegally by panchayats, in case of the Samajwadi Awas Yojana, the sanction will be given by a development authority or the housing board. "No panchayat can sanction a map of any builder," said a senior housing official. "Any such colony is deemed to be classified unauthorized. The new scheme seeks to put a check on that."